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America leads the world in wealth and military power. Unfortunately, we also lead the world in mass incarceration and gun deaths. And we lead the world in another unconscionable area: maternal morbidity and infant mortality.
Last month, Olympic champion Tori Bowie was found dead in Florida from complications from childbirth. She was 32 years old and by all appearances was in excellent health.
Her tragic loss of life and her story echo the painful kinship experienced by too many black women: the risks and pain of being black and pregnant in America.
FILE – Tori Bowie of the United States gestures after receiving her gold medal in the women’s 100m final of the World Athletics Championships in London, Monday, August 7, 2017. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant, File)
This Father’s Day, I’m thinking of Tori Bowie’s family and all of the black women’s partners and families who needlessly and tragically lost their lives in what should have been their most beautiful and precious moment.
Olympic gold medalist Tori Bowie dies of childbirth complications, autopsy reveals
I know what it feels like to be standing next to a hospital bed, terrified that the woman you love won’t come out of the room. When one of our babies was born, it meant complications for her wife from pre-eclampsia. Another is that the baby had a uterine tear and her wife had to undergo an emergency caesarean section.
I remember walking around the hallway praying with all my heart that she and the baby would be all right. Years later, the feeling still haunts me.
I am so grateful to be able to spend this Father’s Day with my wife, Melissa, and our three children, Jelani, Marcel, and Maya. But as a black father, I can’t celebrate this holiday when the black women around me are in a state of emergency. A mother’s health issue is also a father’s issue, and it is the responsibility of all of us to ensure a safe childbirth experience for women, especially black women.
![Tori Bowie in 2016](https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2023/05/640/320/Tori-Bowie5.jpg?ve=1&tl=1)
FILE – Former Southern Mississippi star and Olympic gold medalist Tori during halftime of a college football game between Louisiana Tech University and Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, on Friday, November 25, 2016. Bowie smiles. (Susan Broadbridge/Hattiesburg, Associated Press, American, File)
Consider our position. The maternal mortality rate for black mothers in the United States is global Abnormal. By 2021, the national maternal mortality rate for black women will be 69.9 per 100,000 live births, nearly three times the mortality rate for white mothers and nearly six times the mortality rate for high-income countries as a whole. . In Texas, where black women are twice as likely to suffer complications such as sepsis, preeclampsia and severe bleeding, 90% of maternal deaths were preventable. And in my home state of New York, black women account for more than half of all maternal deaths, despite less than a quarter of all babies born in New York City.
U.S. Maternal Mortality Is Rising, CDC Reports
While poverty and geography exacerbate the risks, the devastating reality is that no amount of money, prestige, access or success can fully protect black women in childbirth. It is systemic, institutional racism that kills our black women.
Bowie’s Olympic teammate Allyson Felix also suffered from pre-eclampsia and underwent an emergency C-section to save her and her daughter’s lives. Serena Williams has opened up about the suspicion and neglect she faced during four emergency surgeries, including the one that left her near death from a blood clot. Beyoncé also suffered from pre-eclampsia and other birth complications, eventually giving birth to twins in an emergency operation that required weeks of hospitalization. These women are wealthy and in exceptional health, yet medical professionals have seen the color of their skin and refused to explain their pain. The lack of humanity is unimaginable.
Olympic Gold Medalist Tori Bowie Found Dead in Home After Medical Examination, Officials Say
It doesn’t stop there. To those who say, “Why are you talking about race? Black women aren’t the only ones who suffer from inadequate maternity care,” I say: you are absolutely right. .
Many are quick to isolate this as an issue that only affects black women. This is wrong on many levels. First, despite the fact that the United States spends the most on health care, the U.S. maternal mortality rate surpasses other wealthy nations for all racial categories of women. Even excluding race entirely, the U.S. maternal mortality rate is her 32.9 per 100,000 live births, more than ten times hers. higher than other high-income countries such as Australia, Austria, Israel, Japan and Spain.
We have all the technology, medical practice and financial resources to prevent these deaths. So why not? I’ve fought this issue since I was first elected, and interest rates have only gotten worse. We fundamentally do not value a woman in this country enough to save her life. And as with all problems, black people suffer the most under systemic bankruptcy.
Tori Bowie’s agent says after Olympian’s death: ‘Everything would have been handled differently’
Childbirth should never be a death sentence. Especially not in a country as resource-rich as the United States.
We can and must reject it. This requires a complete rethink and redesign of healthcare in this country.I have to pass my colleague, Rep. Lauren Underwood. monnibus invoice, expand prenatal and postnatal care to marginalized women everywhere. We need more black women gynecologists, doctors, doulas and midwives and increase their expertise in the birthing process.
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We provide high quality access so that women in rural areas don’t have to drive 40 kilometers for each appointment or women in big cities have to wait 2, 3 or even 4 hours. should invest in good midwifery and obstetric care facilities. Crowded emergency room. And we urgently need universal health care for all Americans. Then the mother would not be forced to choose between her health and her family’s financial future.
And beyond the delivery room and hospital, we need to ensure that new mothers and young families have the support they need to grow. This means guaranteed parental leave, universal child care and expanded support for parents during and after pregnancy.
As a man, I can’t fully comprehend the pain and journey of childbirth. But as a Black man and a father, it is my responsibility to listen to and elevate the experiences of Black women. Because this crisis is not a burden black women can or should carry alone. Even under an inherently racist system, it is also our responsibility as fathers, partners, brothers and ultimately, as men, to demand the safety and dignity of childbirth.
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Because the death of a mother is a threat to all of us. They are a threat to our partners. My children; our family has been irreparably shattered due to complications all too common with completely preventable births. I remember women like Tori Bowie. They should still be with us, sprinting, running and flying with little girls todling behind us.
And I recommit myself to stand by and fight for women in my district and in my life to end the maternal mortality crisis once and for all.